


Staff Meeting

by Maeve_of_Winter



Category: The Trixie Belden Mysteries - Julie Campbell Tatham & Kathryn Kenny
Genre: Cliche, Fanon, Gen, Humor, Metafiction, Parody
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-16 20:12:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13643610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maeve_of_Winter/pseuds/Maeve_of_Winter
Summary: After enduring one too many off-the-wall fanfic stories, the Trixie Belden characters have some choice words for a certain fic author . . .





	Staff Meeting

Thoroughly annoyed, fourteen-year-old Trixie Belden bursts through the entrance to the Director’s office, the door smacking against the wall. The force of her actions causes the various diplomas on the walls, all from fictitious academies—Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Winchester University of Monster Hunting, and  Xavier Institute for Higher Learning—to rattle in their frames.

“What is this?” She demands, waving around a sheaf of papers.

“That’s my latest script,” the Director explains. She’s a young woman dressed like a stereotypical hipster, with unruly hair that’s unevenly dyed electric blue, as if she never outgrew her scenester phase in middle school. In accordance with her outfit, she’s holding some overpriced seasonal beverage from Starbucks. Her posture is casual, lounging behind an IKEA desk incongruously decorated with various pretentious antiquities, including an old-fashioned typewriter she does not actually know how to operate. At the moment, she’s idly fiddling with some utterly useless geometric desk decoration. The only papers near her are a few well-worn takeout menus from nearby restaurants.

“Another Jane story, really?” Trixie asks in disbelief. “You haven’t written a single story about me, but you’re writing your hundredth story starring Jane? C’mon, she was only there for a single book!”

“I write whatever my muses tell me to write,” the Director protests. “They’re the ones in charge of the story, not me.”

“In that case, do you think you could get ol’ Thalia and Calliope to give you some inspiration where I’m concerned?” Trixie queries. “I’m tired of only occasionally getting a mention in your Dan stories about how I foisted Bobby off to him. I realize I don’t I have horrible parents or tremendously overblown angst or a sufficiently weird name to really catch your interest. But you could always write a story about me solving a mystery, you know.”

“It’s not my interest that’s the issue. It’s my muses,” the Director again insists. “The characters speak to me. You tell me what to do.” 

“And I’m telling you to write a fic about me solve a mystery.” Trixie folds her arms across her chest.

“A story about Trixie solving a mystery, huh?” The Director grabs a legal pad and jots down a few words. “That’s a novel idea. I should try to get that published and start a cash cow! It’ll be my top priority—right after my intensely intellectual fic about how canon totally supports that Dan is a demon-angel-werewolf-witch hybrid. Trixie, you get to be the close-minded snob who shuns Dan for being different—just like you did in canon in  _ The Black Jacket Mystery _ .”

Trixie groans. “You know, it says an awful lot about your writing that I would rather dust the house every day for the rest of my life than get stuck with the bit parts you give me in your stories.”

* * *

 

“Oh, woe,” says one of the Director’s dozens of original characters with a bizarre name, melodramatically posing at a cemetery in the rain. The atmosphere, combined with heavily symbolic flowers added to offset the grim, gritty darkness, not only conveyed deep, compelling angst, but also gave the scene enough edginess to fell each and every tree throughout all of America’s national parks. “I am enduring difficult circumstances, and I will reveal their toll on me through syntax and vocabulary far too sophisticated for any teenager to ever realistically use. Life is such pain!”

“Wow!” The Director cheers. “This is great stuff! So dark and edgy!” 

“It’s certainly . . . an experience,” Jim remarks, watching with a bemused expression as he sips a cup of coffee.

Swinging her arm, the Director knocks the mug out of his hands, and it shatters on the floor.

“What the hell?” Jim demands. “What was that for?”

“Your coffee wasn’t dark enough.” The Director gestures to the set. “With all this trauma and darkness, the only beverage edgy enough to even be allowed in the vicinity of the set is black coffee.”

Jim rolls his eyes.

Brian strolls up to them. “Much as I hate to interrupt the soliloquy of Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way over there, I noticed an inconsistency in one of your scripts.”

“Oh, is it about the first name of Jane’s father?” The Director carelessly waves a hand. “Don’t worry. That’s only changed about five different times since I started writing my Jane series. It’s no big deal.”

“Actually, it’s a section where you wrote Dan’s eyes as ‘cornflower blue’ rather than your usual canon contradictory ‘icy blue.’ ” Brian arches an eyebrow. “What, were you so determined to transform him into a pale, emo vampire kid that you resorted to ripping off of the White Court vampires in  _ The Dresden Files _ ?”

The Director scowls. “For your information, it must have been the interns who made that mistake. I was letting them give input to some of my scripts.”

“Well, it’s probably not all that hard to imitate one of your stories,” Jim muses. “Take Dan, Jane, or some oddly-monikered OC. Add in awful parents, boatloads of angst, and information that blatantly contradicts canon, including OOC behavior. Include a few overly detailed descriptions of what people are wearing, and maybe talk about nature for a bit. Reference geek pop culture. If Dan or Jane isn’t in the fanfic already, throw in a few lines about how they’re the most awesome, special, and cool people on the planet. And bam, you’re done.”

“Why do you give Dan blue eyes, by the way?” Brian asks the Director. “Just to make him into the perfect ‘Byronic hero’ and/or emo vampire-ish figure for your stories?”

The Director shrugs. “I don’t see the big deal. Canon mistakenly gave Jim and Honey blue eyes. Even Diana’s were described as ‘blue-violet.’ Why shouldn’t Dan get in on the fun and have blue eyes, too?”

“ _ I  _ never got blue eyes,” Brian reminds her.

“That’s because you were too busy not aging despite one of your most prominent subplots hinging on your birthday celebration,” the Director informs him coolly.

“With that reasoning, does that mean I’ll become a blond in your stories, since some canon discrepancies referred to Honey as one?” Jim asks.

“If you like,” the Director says grudgingly. “But not before I write my story that proves you inferior to Dan in all possible ways.”

Jim sighs. “Well, yeah. I mean, it’s pretty much par for the course in your stories that everyone, even Jesus, is inferior to Dan, isn’t it?”

* * *

“The sun rises over the beach, its light bleeding over the sand . . . like blood. A new day should bring life and hope, the sun a charging warrior against the forces of darkness. But this morning, as the sun rises, its light threading a tapestry of day among the emerging clouds in the bright, celestial blue sky, the beach’s lone occupant is only reminded . . . of death,” the Director narrates pretentiously.

A vampirish-looking Dan, his pale skin doubtlessly going to be described and emphasized in numerous poetic terms by the story text, stands against a background of dramatic, windswept seaside cliffs. He wears black jeans, one of his dozens of pairs of work books, and a flimsy white shirt, its buttons left undone. 

“My pain resonantes on the stony facades of these ocean cliffs,” Dan begins as the breeze theatrically ruffles his always sleek black hair and brings his shirt to billow out around him. “Like the sunlight moving across the landscape, it briefly vanishes, only to return the next day! A temporary respite from my lifelong agony—but never anything more! My existence is surely a tormented one, and I sometimes wonder—”

“Wait, wait, wait,” the director interrupts. “Dan, why is your shirt open?”

“Hm?” Dan glances down at his carefully manscaped bare chest. “Oh, my script says I should be. It was specifically mentioned that I should look like ‘the hero on the cover of a romance novel’ for this scene.”

“Let me see that.” The Director snatches the script. “God, I think one of the interns screwed this up, too. The note is handwritten in purple pen and was added later on, after the script was finalized.”

“It was most likely a legitimate instruction,” Diana says, hastily hiding her purple pen behind her back. “You should definitely follow your custom script, Dan.”

“Yeah, no,” the Director declares. “Dan, you’re fourteen years old in this scene. I’m not going to model your wardrobe after some hyper-sexualized image. I have  _ some _ standards. Not a lot, but a few. Button up.”

“You could just increase his age for this scene,” Honey suggests. “Or simply have him at the age that’s implied by canon.”

The Director shrugs. “He was never given a concrete age in canon. Had he been, I wouldn’t write him as unrealistically young as I do. Well, actually, who knows what I would do in defiance of canon if Dan ever were given a numerical age.”

“Just one scene of Dan with his shirt open,” Trixie wheedles. “Seriously, of all issues to take a moral stance on,  _ this _ is the one you choose?”

“No and no,” the Director replies resolutely. “If you want to read creepy stuff about a fourteen-year-old boy, you’ll have to sate that urge with a Laurell K. Hamilton novel.”

“Well, you’ve already got those try-hard goth outfits she likes about right,” Trixie mutters.

“I heard that!” The Director jabs a finger at Trixie. “And just for your smart remark, missy, I’m going to include a line in Dan’s latest story about you ditching Bobby and expecting Dan to watch him for you.”

“Hmph.” Trixie puts her hands on her hips. “I suppose it’s one  _ more _ thing for Danny Boy to angst about, right?”

* * *

By the time the Director drags Regan onto the set, shooting for the day is nearly finished, much to the relief of the cast.

“Okay,” the Director says, clapping her hands together. “This is a tense scene between two blood relatives, characterized by years of conflict and drama. The air is rife with tension, with secrets, with knowledge. So, show me that! Give me all of your passion, all of your pain! And . . . go!” She signals for the cameraman to begin filming.

For several seconds, Dan and Regan just stand there, looking around with uncertain expressions.

Finally, Regan speaks.

“I hate you, Dave,” he says.

“ _ Dan _ ,” the Director hisses.

“Hi,” Dan whispers back to her, before turning his attention to Regan. “So, then you really do hate me, Bill. Why?”

“ _ Liam _ ,” the Director corrects.

“Your dead mother,” Regan tells him. “I’ve never forgiven her for leaving me at GameStop. Err, I mean, the orphanage.”

The squeaking of a marker on paper brings them to glance over at the Director, who quickly finishes writing and holds up a cue card with the message:  _ NEEDZ MOAR ANGST!!!!1! _

“My parents are dead,” Regan declares.

“Yeah, me, too,” Dan tells him impatiently. “That’s why you’re my guardian.”

The Director amends the cue card to add: +  _ Edginess _ . 

Regan clears his throat. “Your guyliner is super weird,” he tells Dan awkwardly.

“How dare you say such a thing,” Dan replies woodenly.

The Director sighs happily. “So deep! So profound! This is getting to be a regular masterpiece.”

* * *

“Thank God. Another day over,” Diana says with a sigh of relief as she wearily punches her timecard.

“Not quite yet.” The Director materializes in front of the BWGs to unanimous protest. 

“What is it this time?” Mart groans.

“Homework for you and Dan, my official geek BFFs.” The Director indicates two forklift pallets of comic books and science fiction novels. “There’s a pile for each of you. I need you to learn this information wholeheartedly so we can film the two of you having an impassioned discussion tomorrow. Pop culture is the best when it’s obscure information scattered throughout a fanfic story as meta references to the overarching plot.”

“There’s barely anything in canon to support Mart as a science fiction geek, and nothing in canon even hints that I’m one,” Dan grumbles.

“It’s something I added,” the Director snaps irritably. “I do that.”

“We’ve noticed,” Brian says under his breath.

“The idea of Mart and I being best friends isn’t canon, either,” Dan complains.

“And yet it’s one addition that I can’t take credit for creating,” the Director responds tartly.

“I think there needs to be a union for fanfiction characters,” Honey remarks dolefully.

Trixie snorts. “The real mystery the Director should have me solve is where in the world she gets her characterization from.”


End file.
